


In Holding

by MissMarionette



Category: Naruto
Genre: "Aren't you the one writing her in this situation?" "Um EXCUSE ME sir...", Bathing/Washing, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, F/M, Hinata tries her best as anyone would and she shall not be shamed for failing, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Non-Consensual Oral Sex, Non-Consensual Touching, POV Third Person Limited, Rape/Non-con Elements, Sexual Content, Sexual Slavery, Stockholm Syndrome WILL NOT be featured, fuck that sheeit, none of y'all forget that, you have to do what you can to survive
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-28
Updated: 2018-04-03
Packaged: 2018-05-23 16:13:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 12
Words: 13,764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6122122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissMarionette/pseuds/MissMarionette
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Brief pieces featuring Hinata in Deidara's keep. Non-con. Each chapter is to be treated as both a stand-alone and in conjunction with a vague aimless narrative. Completely played straight as I try to write realistic rape trauma as accurately as possible.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Leash

**Author's Note:**

> I went on this website, called Spinny Spinning Thing and it generated a prompt for me. You can do it too. http://www.spinnything.com/cgi-bin/sstprompt.py . Have at 'er. You needn't require someone to give you prompts ever again. I literally wrote this in less than 20 minutes after I got the prompt (shrug).

It has been awhile since she has been allowed to scream, despite the fact that she can't remember a time when she didn't feel the compulsion to.

His disposition towards the choked whimpers she makes seem to change from day to day. Sometimes they irritate him, sometimes they arouse him. It doesn't make the sex any more enjoyable whether he snaps at her or lavishes her with attention.

When his hands wrap around her collar's chain and pulls, she feels like she's about to both choke and vomit. The loud chattering of the links against the floor makes her shiver and she often ends up silently weeping while she's forced to crawl towards him for her meal.

She hates it. She absolutely despises it but there is nothing she can do.

There are times when being a good prisoner earns her a reward. She is well aware of the dangers of Stockholm Syndrome, she knows that looking forward to a captor's kindness is dangerous, but she has been in this cell for so long and a day hasn't gone by when he hasn't raped her.

She takes her breaks whenever she can get them. The mind can only take so much.

She's not willing to go crazy. She is willing to lie on her back and take him inside her for those few moments after his climax when he gathers her up close and holds her. She can close her eyes and pretend it's someone else. At least with sex she can pretend someone cares. Even if it's actually him and there is no tenderness. At least she still has her imagination, her ability to create.

She hasn't quite given up on ever being rescued, but in concurrence with that...she figures she should devote her energies to the here and now. 

He is sitting at the table with the chain in the hand that is being used to prop up his head. He watches offhandedly as she services him. If she does this well he sometimes doesn't penetrate her. At this point she really doesn't prefer it either way, but she knows not to make her apathy known.

When she is finished he grins and grabs a hold of her chin. His thumb pushes its way past her lips and she obediently sucks on it like a child. He thinks it's erotic. Her body would disagree.

It turns out he wants her after all. She climbs into his lap and he tortures her with his hand until she finds her own release. She is allowed to find momentary solace in his embrace while he idly rubs the moisture from between her legs directly into her skin like a balm. 

When she wakes up the next morning they're in bed and his arms are around her. If she remains completely still they could sleep the whole day away. She is counting on it.


	2. Speech

It doesn't take much to make her cry. He seems to enjoy that most about her.

He stands there, tall, arms folded, and destroys her. Words that she has heard from family, friends, and foes. Demeaning words. Hurtful, careless comments. Knives in her heart and throat.

She has developed panic attacks from his verbal assault, day after day after day after day. Sometimes even wayward compliments do this, too. Because that mouth that bites and licks and scorns shouldn't say such sweet things. Not to her. Never to her.

"You didn't have much of a chance facing off against me, but still..no wonder your father disowned you, yeah."

_"You have such beautiful skin."_

"With breasts this big, it's no wonder you became a chunin. You probably slept with the exam proctors to pass. Admit it."

_"You look like a princess, you know that?"_

"Useless. You're absolutely useless without your chakra, yeah."

_"Come here, let me brush your hair. It doesn't deserve to be all messy like that. Take better care of yourself when I'm not here."_

"You love it when I'm inside you. Say it. Say it!"

_"Shh, shh, don't cry..."_

Her nightmares began to consist of people without mouths. She floats in space and something inky and black emanates from her skin. She walks and he's there and despite not seeing his mouth move, his words echo and stamp themselves on her skin and she lies there bleeding. And he rapes her. And she can still see and feel him while she slowly dies. And it resets itself. And it repeats. And she cannot escape.

"If you want food...well, you know what to do, yeah. Remember, don't use your teeth."

How she wishes the world would, for one day, go silent.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> where the fuck did this even come from. why can't I write something more coherent.. ugh ugh ugh.


	3. Behind Her

The room was silent except for the sound of sighing and panting from behind her.

She shivered once again when his fingers slid up her bare stomach to cup her breasts, the ropes attaching her to the headboard straining as she attempted to lean forward away from his touch. Her thighs shook to maintain the weight of her kneeling for so long on the lumpy bed.

The nervous sweat that covered her skin made her so cold, so desperate to curl up in a blanket and fall asleep forever.

Hinata was surprised her teeth had not yet bitten entirely through her lower lip after all this time, so determined to not cry, to not speak, to not give him the satisf--

She sucked in air when her head was pulled back from the painful grip in her hair. Her throat exposed to the open air which during certain times he had almost wrung to the point of her losing consciousness. 

Instead he--Deidara, missing-nin, her captor and fledgling torturer--pinched one of her nipples between manicured fingernails in such a way that she was afraid he was trying to completely separate it from her body.

Hinata's teeth dug deeper and deeper into her lip, the position of her neck wrenched farther back, so far that it made swallowing difficult. So far that she could catch a glimpse of his flipped visage.

Mentally she flipped over his expression and found his teeth were bared and his brows were drawn together in something caught between irritation and zeal.

He lowered his mouth to her ear to say something, and whatever quip he murmured before pushing her head back down into the musty pillow didn't matter. Remembering them never helped her situation. He did as he pleased whether she responded or not, whether she begged or, in rare instances of defiance, talked back.

For she could only present herself as a spoil to be exploited and abused and damaged and sometimes mended.

His hands on her upraised hips flexed, and it always frightened her for that split-second: She was afraid that during one of these times he could smash her pelvis into powder if he pressed them together too hard. Perhaps he could, given his penchant in explosives.

After rudely slapping her outer thigh to bid her to spread her legs farther apart (which she immediately did to help speed this humiliation along) he made his customary--albeit tedious--preparations to help ease the process of entering her.

His tongue on her backside felt more alien and odd than pleasurable, but it was much preferred than when he would enter her "sweet pink cunt" without lubricant. Those times never failed to make her cry.

She could only wait with dread and allow herself to be manipulated _just so_ to set the stage for when he would conquer her like the man he seemed desperate to convince her he was.

It didn't matter to her at this point. All that mattered was if he was gentle. If he was sympathetic.

He rarely was.

Hinata sucked in air through her teeth once again when his penis attempted to breach the first inch of her anus. His chest now pressed against her back as he whispered unhelpful advice such as "breathe" and "relax", perhaps to delude himself that this was a much more intimate moment than it was.

Damn him to Hell.

After what seemed like an eternity of an inescapable muscle-aching sensation, he pressed even further and groaned softly.

Between clenched teeth she heard him grunt out something along the lines of "Fucking tight...so tight..gods be damned..."

The pillow was warming up from where she had laid her face up until now. She wished she had the ability to flip it over. She was beginning to sweat. The tips of her fingers were tingling: Soon she wouldn't be able to tell if they were there at all.

Tonight he was impatient, for he rescinded his kind gesture of practicing empathy in order for her body to accommodate him. Now he began to work to loosen her up with his own brute force, and there the aching pains immediately began to set in.

He never used a condom and he almost always came inside of her, no matter if it was her anus or vagina. The first time it occurred after assaulting the latter she felt an overwhelming sense of fear. But the days went by, then a few weeks, and she felt no different (well, dirtier of course).

And he did it again in the meantime. And then again. And again. Multiple times a day sometimes, at least several times a week if not that. No change. Those changes that she was old enough to know would happen because of his disinclination to _prevent_ what should inevitably occur.

The unspoken question hung in the air since being raped for the first time and failing to conceive:

Was she barren? Could she not have children?

Was he...sterile?

She had no pity for him if that was the case; the thought of her being infertile was an afterthought, a mere blink of sadness in a pool of more pressing neuroses.

Hinata's mind drifted into this sort of inner musings and detached analysis of her situation until he finished. There was that split second of terror that her hips were going to be crushed between his hands as his gripped tightened frighteningly hard, his mouth groaning obscenities into her mid-back.

The afterglow of his high was spent unnecessarily kissing and licking her shoulder blades while pumping slowly, undoubtedly planning on getting his money's worth.

Hinata offhandedly realized her hands had lost circulation by now. She couldn't feel her knuckles rubbing together nor how much sweat had accumulated in her palms. It wasn't that it was so urgent to untie her, not for either of them. He had informed her that his partner had done him a favor and basically stopped up her chakra nerves so that it only flowed enough to keep her alive. For all intents and purposes, she was a civilian, not a shinobi.

In some ways, perhaps it was for the best. How could she live with herself each day under his care, knowing she was allowed to retain certain faculties but remained incapable of executing a means of escape at every opportune moment? At least this way, she had an excuse. At least this way, her conscience and self-doubt could rest easy. There was nothing she could do, objectively speaking, nothing but take pleasure where it was offered; placate him; survive.

He bid she lie down and with a weariness that always consumed her after nights like these--or was it day time, she hadn't been able to tell in a long time. He followed her down, reaching up to untie her hands from the headboard, mouth lazily gnawing on her ear in the meantime.

What was worse: Him biting it off with his teeth or his horrible words?

She closed her eyes and went still, silently praying that he would allow her to tend to herself after she was freed. It was leaking out of her, it was sticky and it felt uncomfortable, like diarrhea. Disgusting. Absolutely disgusting.

Hinata's ears burned upon hearing his lewd comment regarding how good her ass felt tonight (today?). He was crushing her with his full weight against her upper back now, undoubtedly leaning with everything he had to impose upon her. She could feel his spent penis pressed between her back and his stomach, felt his panting slowly die away into calmer and heavier breaths.

She wanted to clean herself, more than anything

She wanted to completely empty herself of everything, more than anything.

He didn't let her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> List of things I'm uncomfortable writing about: 1) Purely sexy "begin to enjoy it" rape, 2) Dirty/demeaning talk, 3) Sex slaves that learn to love being sex slaves UNLESS there's some kernel of SSC "training" that is undergone or they have a choice in being one. (I.e. not Hinata in this story).
> 
> What is presented in this is my attempt to convey the fact that honestly, this shit isn't sexy. It's so compelling because it's dark and psychological, yes it most certainly is, but I don't get off on this. I'm trying to make it as guileless as possible while still being a bit...poetic and pretentious about it, I guess (-3-) 
> 
> I've been a fan of Deidara as a character for so long that I've personally Flanderized him as someone he isn't, so this fanfiction is an exercise in trying to characterize him as someone a bit more ruthless and well, villainous.


	4. Breasts

His tongue left a wet trail along her cheek. The act only encouraged more tears to fall to replace the ones he had just licked away.

Panting on her part from behind a gag. In the beginning, he had made it very clear that he hated it when she stuttered. That very first night he had her silenced because she couldn't string along a sentence, let alone a plea, without choking on the syllables out of sheer terror. Until recently, he either cracked her across the face to shut her up or stuffed something into her mouth so all he could hear was her muffled pained whines when he roughly entered her. But those times were becoming less and less, thankfully.

Not this time, though. She hadn't even spoken a word today but he put one on her regardless for this particular session of sex. Perhaps he missed having an excuse to use it since she hadn't given him one in quite awhile.

For now he was content in building up the tension and the fear, fondling her in a sickening way, tracing forbidden places that he had come to know better than her.

She hated it. She hated that he knew how to easily undo her within only a few minutes of persistent, thorough exploration. She hated how he would bring her to the brink over and over. And over. And over. And never let those two sparks in her head join together to create blooming flowers of bliss. The only time when she felt a smidgen of peace. The only time when she could convince herself that this suffering did have intermittent periods of light, or rather shades of gray to offset the black.

His hand reached up from between her legs to grab ahold of her breast. She jolted when he began to pinch the nipple hard; she weakly attempted to twist in an attempt to throw him off, all the while playing an instinctual, visceral chant in her head:

It hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts.

Puberty, unfortunately, had not been very kind to her. At least, when taking this situation of hers into consideration. She had been very sensitive and self-conscious about her chest size when the time came for her bras to be traded up from easily obscured B's to troublesome G's. It's why she had insisted on wearing a parka even during the summer back when she was a tween.

His initial discovery of their natural size brought him no small amount of amusement. Among his teasing and jeers were comparisons between her and a cow and how easy it would be to milk her "teats". She was a natural-born slut; how could she explain how fucking huge her tits were if a man hadn't pawed at them since her days at the academy? Maybe her Daddy did it behind closed doors? It'd explain things. Maybe that fox boy--

It had mortified her. She had been so overcome with pure embarrassment and shame that she vomited before passing out. When she came to she discovered he had hastily wiped her off and had his way with her anyway. Her chest had been littered with bite marks which seemed to ache whenever she unintentionally caught sight of his toothy grin in the days afterward.

This time, though, he did not devolve into childish name-calling. Instead his hand on her chest slid up to lightly brush against her cheek as he began to kiss over the sweat-sheened skin with a gentleness she had not experienced in what felt like weeks.

The tears in her eyes seemed to pause when he closed his eyes and whispered "beautiful" with a reverence she didn't think she had ever heard from him before, not towards her. His fingers experimentally dug into the supple flesh and grasped as he nestled his face into her bosom.

After a few moments he loosened the gag to let it fall below her chin. She tilted her head up to meet his shining eye. He parted his lips and she knew he was about to grace her with his words.

They were thus:

"You have beautiful skin, yeah..." He said softly.

She didn't know what to say to that, so she remained silent and nodded her head, a single tuck of her chin into her sternum.

His hair tickled her skin when he set the weight of his head fully upon her chest. For a moment she had forgotten how to breathe. A panicked inhale of breath lifted his face before settling down. The sharp bob of his visage made him snort derisively. She didn't care.

"Tell me honestly, little girl.." he drawled as he idly traced the circumference of one of her areolas with a well-manicured fingernail, "do you like it when I suck on your nipples?"

The correct answer. The correct answer that would prevent pain and anger was-- was--

Hinata swallowed. There wasn't enough moisture in her throat for her anxiety to slip down painlessly.

Softly, demurely, "It..It feels b-better than when you bite them."

A beat of silence for him to process what she said before he reacted with a disarmingly charming crooked grin.

Her hands twitched at her sides when he turned his head and secured his mouth over one of them, as if he simply wanted her verbal approval before doing so. He never cared before. Never.

After the initial shock, she willed herself to relax and enjoy what he was doing. She concentrated on the way his tongue moved against her skin, focused on how her body was responding. On instinct her thighs pressed against his hips in the process of trying to come together to create friction for the heat pulsing between them.

Without pausing his ministrations his hand slid down her stomach and lightly cupped the mound he had personally shaved last night. He enjoyed the smoothness of her skin down there. It was a personal preference that held no bearing on his treatment of her except that he was very careful when handling a razor in such an intimate place. She at least had to be thankful for that.

The tongue that lay dormant in that hand--that scary, disturbing thing--flit against her skin mindlessly and she let out a soft moan to express her approval.

In doing so she wanted him to know that if he truly cared about her, if he put an iota of stock in the pride that men generally held in their abilities to please a woman, that this was what she wanted. Gentleness. Passion, yet not painfully so.

They both knew she didn't want this, and they both knew he didn't care what she wanted in the grand scheme of things. Despite this, him making her feel good, him at the very least not wanting to make her suffer was an idea worthy of entertaining.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y'all don't know how much my skin crawled typing the question Deidara asked Hinata. God damnit.


	5. Fantasizing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Looks into the mirror)  
> (Points at reflection) You need to stop with this depressing shit right now.

During the long periods of nothing, Hinata fantasizes.

Not of escape or rescue, but of water and soap to clean herself with.

There is never enough time during her regularly scheduled baths to completely scour the top layer of her skin off. In his eyes it is clean and what she is doing is overkill, but she can feel it. She can still feel the sweat and the semen and the saliva and the blood covering her body.

If she had a knife she'd be tempted not to stab him but to cut open her own flesh in order to scrub the filth that she knows has penetrated deep inside her. Places that are closed up and out of her reach at present time. But she can still sense the dirtiness within her that needed to be cleansed. That, to her slowly unraveling mind, will likely never be purified.

The realization hits her slowly but the reverberations cause her to physically shake and gasp for air as she begins to fully cry.

He notices. He always notices. And unfortunately this is not one of those times when he ignores her.

She thrashes half-heartedly when he hauls her to the bed and pulls down her underwear.

As far as she can gather, he believes that if she's able to cry she's able to be fucked by him. Sometimes this philosophy holds true. Technically, this was one of those times.

The way he ignores her blubbering and weak "stop, stop"s is an art in of itself. Even as she says this she opens her legs in order to avoid inconveniencing him. He has reduced her to this, to expressing her heart plainly and nakedly while her body robotically obeys to do that which he had forcibly drilled into her over time.  
  
He takes it as consent. It is, but on the surface. A formality. A falsehood.  
  
As expected, it hurts. How many more times could she take this sensation of painful stretching, this fear of something vital being torn inside her, out of her?

Blood begins to flow. A wave of nausea overcomes her. She swallows it done, tries to think of something, anything that could distract her. 

It's impossible because he has her long hair twisted around his fist and is pulling it in time with his thrusts. It hurts, it hurts, it hurts it hurts it

"It hurts, it hurts, it hurts, pl-pl-please, _pl-please..."_  

He only goes faster, she only whimpers more. The bed has been shaking the entire time, her knees have been quaking, threatening to buckle. 

He fills her up with his redundant semen. Despite pregnancy seemingly a non-issue (no missed periods after what, 4 months?) that split second of panic still overwhelms her. When he lets go of her hips her legs fold and she's left clutching weakly at the comforter, trying to hold back bile at the sensation of it easily flowing out from between her legs.  
  
He cleans himself up and leaves, just like that. The only reason he had visited was to rape her and leave. At least he didn't make her orgasm this time. Or perhaps that's a shame because it hurts so much and despite the fact there's a towel hanging on the chair to her right she can't find the resolve to move and get it.  
  
Tears dripping down her face, Hinata stares at the wall and thinks of the blood flowing through her veins, how much she would like to spill it on her own terms, for once.


	6. Teeth

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Man, where am I getting these ideas. All of these were pre-written, so this marks the end of frequent updates, not that anyone really cares  
> (~-_0)~ . How do you even end something like this. Can it even be ended. Who knows. Guess this is just a collection featuring the kind of messed-up captor/captive dynamic that isn't in nearly enough abundance on AO3. You're welcome.

He smells like earth.

It is not a bad smell nor a good one. It simply is.

It fills her nose when his hand is pressed against her face, bidding her to kindly keep quiet while he bites her stomach, hard.

During these times she settles for gripping his wrist in a pathetic attempt to alleviate his weight, for he seems almost determined to push her straight through the mattress; while her nose is uncovered and therefore her breathing only half-restricted, she still feels like she's suffocating.

Hinata was always lithe and slender as a child. Exercise and training did not build muscle but kept fat off. The Hyuuga clan were naturally lean as one only needed to rely on chakra and proper form in order to incapacitate an enemy with well-placed palm strikes.

Deidara, on the other hand, has muscle. Not enough to be overwhelming, but enough that she watches with mild horror as the veins beneath the flesh of his arm stand at attention while he pushes and pushes and pushes her down.

He doesn't even seem to be aware of how much he's hurting her mouth, her jaw, her pretty pretty face that he boths despises and loves.

Her untoned stomach is marred by teeth. She weakly tries to suck in air to avoid them, but the anticipation of pain makes it quiver before spasming back to its relaxed state, ballooning against his lips almost comically. It makes him laugh, and her futile efforts give him enough pause to run his tongue against the welts before dipping into her navel.

That place on the human body that usually collects so much grime and dead skin is frequently washed along with the rest of her nooks and crannies. He has made her fear the sound of running water filling a tub as much as the sight of rope and candle flames.

He is poisoning her with fear. With the stench of his earthy musk.

That hand releases her jaw and Hinata immediately reaches up to go over it with her own light touches in an attempt to soothe herself.

It is only for a few seconds because with a gasp her ankles are gripped tightly as he pulls her into position and bids her to wrap her legs around him.

Without a word she does because she knows acting in this way, as a receptive partner...there are sometimes rewards for her, non-sexual ones. Last time it was a piece of candy. It wasn't even her favorite flavor, it made her molars cement together as she mistakenly tried to chew it ("You don't have such sticky caramel back in Leaf, do you, yeah?" No, no she didn't. She preferred hard candies in the shape of cherries to suck on. She didn't tell him that, though).

He moves inside of her quickly and it is with a jerk that sends a quick bolt of pain in that sensitive, tender place.

He is off, rutting like a dog, biting-biting-biting her chest. So much biting.

Meanwhile, she grips the sheets and looks up at the ceiling and coaches herself to breathe because it will be over soon, it always is.

In a few minutes, it actually is. He shudders and presses against her with one final push inside that triggers the reflex that empties himself inside her. She can feel it. It's hot and wet and _it doesn't belong inside of her_.

He lets out a soft moan of contentment as his face smashes rudely into her chest, making her gasp softly at the impact on her breasts. It almost knocks out a breath she didn't know she had been holding until then.

It is one of those days where she is not left needing, or wanting, relief for herself. Nothing even remotely approaching "pleasure" had just occurred, thankfully. All that was left to anticipate was if and when he would pull out of her.

She wants to sleep.

She finds that she is forced to, with him still inside of her.


	7. Gratitude

He gives her a book to read, one about fairy tales and myths, peach boys and funny raccoon dogs.

She is grateful.

 

* * *

 

He bids she sit down so he can brush her hair. He comments on how illustriously dark it is, how much like a princess she looks, regal and refined in the mirror (despite the circles under her eyes, despite the bruises on her neck when he throttled her two nights ago).

She thanks him quietly.

 

* * *

 

He is concerned with her satisfaction in bed, as if they were a couple. When he is feeling kind, that is. Unnerving and disturbing, but who is she to say "no" anymore when it alleviates the pain?

She keeps her mouth closed the entire time except for the quiet "oh" that never fails to escape her when he pushes her to that point where the pleasure just washes over her like an ocean wave crashing against a cliff.

 

* * *

 

 

He manages to figure out at least one of her favorite dishes and serves it every so often. _Zenzai_.

The words of praise as to its taste and his adequate skill in making it are murmured, genuine in their meaning.

Her words stir him. He forces her to lie on the  _kotatsu_ and rapes her, though it is likely that he thinks he's showing her his appreciation for her manners because his touches are somewhat softer than normal.

She's grateful for that, too, but she keeps quiet this time.

 

* * *

 

He tells her he loves her with his arm around her shoulder in a not-quite-comfortable, not-quite-uncomfortable hold on her at the  _kotatsu_.

Her breath is caught in her throat. 

 

 

 

_He is delusional_

 

 

 

But he has done so much for her...

 

* * *

 

A part of her wants to believe this lie as a truth, that he does care.

 

He loves her, his little Hyuuga _princess_ , his _bitch_ , his _toy_...

 

* * *

 

_No, he doesn't_

 

* * *

 

She does not reply when he repeats this declaration later, just stares ahead with a relaxed expression that offers no hint of her true feelings, of the conclusion of the brief battle where endurance had won out. She would not acknowledge. It would spell the death of who she was.

Naturally, he takes her silence as an insult.

Consequently, he takes her on the _kotatsu_ again, only there are no attempts at being gentle.

But she is used to this, she has grown used to it.

What she hopes she never gets used to is this kindness he seems to ladle out every so often, enticing her to drink, to drown, to accept him.

She can't. Of everything she could do, she simply  _can't_. 

She mustn't.

She won't.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Zenzai is sweet azuki (red bean) soup. According to Hinata's character profile, this is one of her favorite foods, along with cinnamon rolls. Trying not to ruin the mood here, but that's so precious. Thank you Kishimoto for making her favorite food cinnamon rolls, though you undoubtedly are unaware of the connotations we nerds have for them and our favorite characters (^_^);
> 
> And I just want to clear this up. I am spelling Hinata's last name like that on purpose, because I'm stubborn; the U in "Hyuga" and "Jinchuriki" is actually two U's, but it's cleaner to write it as one and denote it with the special dash over the top of the vowel. I don't know, I've seen the 'U' spelled out in succession so many times that it looks wrong when only a single "U" is present. It doesn't look right otherwise (~.___.)~


	8. Blank

The stretches of time that Deidara is away from Hinata gives her time to think.

About what, she doesn't seem to remember a few minutes after the fact. Really it's just an exercise to keep her mind sharp and alert.

With her knees pulled up to her chest and her head resting on her folded arms, she stares at the wall and decides that it was better to simply _not think_.

Not think about home.  
Not think about the sun.  
Not think about Father or Hanabi.  
Not think about Kiba or Shino or Kurenai sensei.  
Not think about Sakura or Ino or TenTen.  
Not think about Lee or Shikamaru or Choji.  
Not think about Naru--

Hinata blinks, because the tears render her vision blurry.

She fails to catch them as they fall.

She fails to see the point in doing so.

Deidara doesn't return.

After not-thinking fails to do the trick, she turns her attention to an intriguing crack on the floor. She spends the next few hours trying to imagine herself inside that crack, how if she were shrunk to microscopic size it could be a crevasse that she could fling herself into to escape this place.

Hinata swears she feels herself shrinking the more she stares at it, tuning out her breathing, her need for the bathroom, or water or food.

* * *

 

When Deidara returns the scent of something meaty and filling is immediately sussed out by her nose.

He greets her in that cocky way of his, standing there with a hand on his hip and the food in a bag. There was half a chance he would share it, half a chance he wouldn't.

She doesn't make a move to convince him one way or another. She had given up with that game. He always made sure to win in anything and everything.

To her mild surprise he sits himself down next to her on the cold stone floor and begins to dig through the bag.

"Here." he says, placing a food container at her feet.

She's hungry. They both know this. There was no point in denying it.

Still holding onto her manners--because it pleases him when she's polite--she murmurs a "thank you" and reaches for it.

His hand stops her and she hates herself for flinching.

"Not yet. You need to do something for me first."

She's so hungry, though.

After a few minutes of him pulling her on top of him and pulling at both of their pants' zippers, Hinata is straddling him and taking him inside of her. She's dry. It hurts.

But she's hungry.

It doesn't feel good at all. He seems to want it that way because every push is jarring and shaking her. No time to let her get used to it. Teeth sink into the flesh around her nipple and latch on as sweat begins to form at his brow.

Her head lolls back to stare at the ceiling and she can only utter the gasps that are pushed out of her gut from the force of his thrusts.

Deidara makes her clean her own blood--and his semen--from his penis with her mouth. When she finishes, she is crying but tears aren't falling for some reason. He bestows upon her the food he had promised. He does it with a smirk and a good-natured pat on her cheek and then extricates himself to the bathroom to take a shower.

Hinata waits until he has closed the door before she investigates her meal, but she feels sick, her vision is wobbly.

She flips open the lid of the container, but regardless of her hunger, that wave of nausea is unmistakable, unpreventable.

She takes one look at the simple rice and vegetables and promptly vomits.

It's yellowish and thick and it looks like his-- she can taste his--

She vomits again.

Daintily she closes the container and sets it beside her and goes back to staring at the crack.

When Deidara returns he immediately notices the mess she's made and punishes her by giving her a swift kick in the head.

She's out cold for a stretch of time. She doesn't know how long. When she comes to, she contends with a hand-sized lump situated on the side of her skull.

He forces her to eat her ruined meal for breakfast.

Somehow she manages.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Deidara, you're such a fucking asshole. Why are you like this. Why am I making you like this. You're lucky you're pretty.


	9. Loyalty

Hinata sits on a rock in the middle of a non-descript field, eyes closed.

With her hands folded in her lap she allows the sun to warm her face and the breeze to tug at her hair. It's grown so much longer than she had ever originally allowed. Washing it has been a hassle lately.

He had recently granted her the privilege of being outside for an hour. That is, when the mood struck him as appropriate, if he felt she had earned it, or was filled by an overwhelming inclination towards generosity.

She spends it wisely, trying to soak up as much fresh air as she can with her lungs and, similarly, sun with her skin.

If she were to open her eyes, she wouldn't find him. Not within plain sight, at least. But he's somewhere, watching her.

She could run, but she doesn't want to.

Pragmatism roots her to the spot she has chosen. Pragmatism and fear.

She doesn't want to test out her theory, but she's sure he would appear suddenly if she made any movements that could be interpreted as an attempt at escape.

Yes, there were means of camouflage that one without chakra could employ, but he was a missing-nin for a reason; his skills were likely beyond hers in range and experience, not to mention the obvious advantages he held over her, being fully within his faculties and her...not.

Hinata's lashes part, and she fixes her gaze on the shadows of the clouds rolling across the field.

She has the urge to leap off the rock and run through the grasses. Not to escape, but simply as a means of exercise. With the exception of frequent sex, she hasn't committed herself to any physical activity that could be labelled "strenuous" up until now. Not in what seems like an eternity.

In her mind's eye she imagines herself racing through the fields, arms raised out at her sides like a child. How would he interpret her actions were she to do that, as she indulged in some immaturity and innocence in a futile attempt to offset the despair he has succeeded in sowing in her heart?

She honestly has no idea how he would react.

Hinata slips off the rock and begins walking. The wild grasses tickle and scratch at her bare hands by her sides as they swing naturally with each step.

She doesn't know where she's going except forward. Her limits are unknown, as well. She assumes he will block her path when she reaches the border of what he considers to be an acceptable distance. She can't stray too far from this Eden he has allowed her to visit.

She stops parallel to a tree a few hundred yards from her. It's a _salix babylonica,_ a weeping willow, and it is so old that its hair-like branches almost reach the ground. It's dark at the base of the tree, shady. Perhaps that is where he is...

Hinata grabs some grass level with her hand and pulls. Segments of the bunch rip away and she continues on, mindlessly splitting the blades and rubbing the seeds loose between her fingers. They blow away and become caught in her shirt.

Idly, she is grateful he has given her clothing to wear that covers up most of her skin. Clothes that remind her of her training outfits-dark in color and modest, oddly enough. She doesn't have any lotion on hand and while she's not the vainest person she doesn't like it when her skin freckles beneath the sun. She doesn't tan. None of the Hyuuga do.

She continues walking, idly brushes some hair behind her ear. It's much longer than she's used to, perhaps almost as long as Hanabi's the..last time she saw her.

Her lips are dry. Something rustles in the grass to her left, startled, and quickly scampers away. It sets off a chain reaction-birds take flight out of the stretch of field for what seems like a whole mile. She pauses to watch it. The breeze carries the sound of frantic flapping.

And suddenly he's there beside her. On reflex she squeezes the grass trapped in her fist, regardless. She doesn't know why. All she knows is she wants to take it with her.

He's an unwelcome intrusion, but she knows he's an expected one. An inevitable and eventual one.

 _But still._.

"Time to go back, yeah." He declares. His arms wrap around her from behind, pin her own to her sides. His chin rests on her shoulder as he tells her that if she behaves he'll let her out more often because a girl like her needs some sun every once in awhile. It's in her name, after all.

She doesn't reply, simply nods once. The startled birds are now resettled in the grass, though where exactly she doesn't know-his sudden reappearance made her lose her focus on them for a few moments.

Deidara kisses her neck. She flinches because his lips are cold. He kisses her like that again, unabated. She feels his hot hand reach up to cup her forehead as he does so, and everything suddenly goes dark.

When Hinata wakes up she is back in the room, lying on the bed. Because the room is made of stone and dimly lit, finding herself stripped down to thin white underclothes is not very optimal.

As she sets herself upright and rises from the bed, her hands loosen their invisible grip. Grass blades and seeds unstick and drift away from her palms. She lets them flutter away, litter the floor without much consideration for cleanliness. It isn't that big of a mess, really.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still no Stockholm Syndrome. Probably had you there for an angstrom of a second but no, I'm still playing this straight. No Stockholm 2K17!! Or something!


	10. Self-Denial

Hinata had come to terms with being Deidara's plaything awhile ago. It is the only reality of which she is certain.

As she lies on her back, staring at the ceiling, she wonders if Sakura or TenTen or Ino would reproach her for giving up so easily.

They wouldn't understand, she has told herself many times. They wouldn't understand how hard it was to fight when there was absolutely no indication that salvation was at hand. When everything you had been taught to defend yourself as a shinobi, as a Hyuuga, as a woman, was taken from you.

When those words that were whispered about the women in the red light district were now turned around to be applied to you. His vicious mouth, his poisonous words, they hurt her. He didn't seem to know how much. Or maybe he did, and that makes him all the more vile in her mind.

So she waits, passively. Without expectations of anything beyond the repetition of what she has thus far endured. Existing day-to-day, minute by minute, scratch by bite by lick by slap by kiss by-

Her mouth parts and she lets out a soft moan, a short one, a simple "oh" when his tongue sweeps up against her, that intimate place that he had defiled many times before through her tears and gasps and initial begging.

She has not begged him to show mercy in a long time, not during the times when she knew that nothing would sway him. He was obstinate like that, sometimes took pleasure in her pleas.

Sometimes he humored her, though. Sometimes he stopped and "kissed it all better" and went slow and she sometimes orgasmed and she sometimes felt good and he sometimes stroked her hair after sex and kissed her cheek and told her she was beautiful and she sometimes cried because why did he act like a lover when she was his plaything and stop it she didn't want this any of this she didn't this did not forgive even a moment of what he has done to her and yet he still-

Hinata's hips cant and press against his face for a second, a reflex at him hitting a proper spot. Deidara's grunts in surprise and Hinata's mouth is immediately filled with apologies and stuttering and visions of punishment and it was enough to make her cry because this was one of those rare moments where he made her feel good and she wanted this to last forever to tide her over until she died because she didn't think she could take much more of this and please she was sorry she was sorry she was sorry-

"Don't be afraid of me." He whispers.

But there were so many reasons to be afraid. So many that he had taught her and explicitly showed her why.

So many she would not like to ever face again.

Threats of knives and rope and fire and explosives and she was sorry sorry sorry-

Like a chant she whispers, "I'm s-sorry, sorry sorry."

He pulls back, perturbed, and with the release of her legs she curls up and squeezes herself tightly to control her shivers.

Sorry. She was sorry. It hurts so much when he's angry so she's sorry she is so sorry.

In this trance of fear he grumbles and leaves her, throwing a weak insult over his shoulder as he stomps to the bathroom to likely relieve himself of the ache she has surely caused him.

In the back of her head she offhandedly muses that tonight is a small victory, one that he will not allow to be repeated for a long time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another one, so soon? Yes! My attempts to write emotionally healthy sex always devolves into this. One day I'll write a lemon for Mutual Comfort, one day...! (shakes fist)
> 
> I have a headcanon (Suspicion? Belief? Idea? Self-evident truth as revealed by our Lord and savior Jesus Christ?) that Deidara is one of the most unstable individuals in the Akatsuki, deep down. Of course we have seen him fly off the handle in the series, but no, he's either really chill and confident or fucking just...GAAAAHHH! He's very childish in some ways, very immature and haughty and narcissistic and my favorite character in the whole show so I hope I relayed these sentiments okay-ish in these stories.
> 
> Fun fact: My favorite TV show is Law and Order: SVU. Sexually-based offenses are not only heinous, they're morbidly fascinating.


	11. Gift

On a day when he seems quite content with her and she in turn feels no qualms about being beaten that day, Hinata quietly asks Deidara for something to play with while he is not around.

There is simply nothing to do. Nothing at all. There are no books in this bare room, no paper to draw or write on, nothing. Only the bed and a side-table drawer next to it; the _kotatsu_ and its cushions; a small dresser with a few outfits for them both; and the door to the bathroom.

Hinata has stopped herself from trying to find shapes in the cracks on the ceiling, terrified it would lead her to go insane. Frustratingly, she only knows bits and pieces of popular tunes from Konoha and her family, but nothing that she can string along into a full song. She had very quickly given up trying to while away the time by acting like her own personal songbird. The echoes her voice makes when it bounces against the bare walls only serve to remind her how _lonely_ she is...

He looks up from the papers laid out all over the _kotatsu_ to consider the Hyuuga princess-though it has been so long since Hinata has ever for a moment considered herself belonging to a privileged position in society-as she stands there placidly in a gray _nemaki_. In the past he has expressed amusement in her habit of tying and folding the fabric tightly to her body which, while leaving no open or loose ends, still blatantly suggest curves she would rather he ignore.

He raises his eyebrows in what _he_ thinks is amicable surprise but instead comes off as a hair's breadth away from being mocking and snide. His hair has been collected and swept in front of one shoulder, tied with a small ribbon near the end, obscuring the interesting black-ink tattoo design on his left breast. The skin there is sensitive, she has learned, and he does not like it when she touches it.

"Hm," he says a little louder than is quite necessary, "something to play with..."

Why must he mock her? Why? Wasn't it enough that she is depending on him to relieve herself from boredom? She who does not ask him for anything anymore, not even to be gentle in bed?

Deidara glances down at the documents and begins to slowly collect them, momentarily ignoring her as she stands there wringing her hands behind her back, wishing he would tell her a simple "yes" or "no" and let her return to lying on the bed in order to stare at the ceiling.

After shuffling them and setting them aside, he balances his chin on laced fingers and offers her a toothy smile that makes her chest ache with dread.

"What are you willing to give in exchange, princess?"

Wordlessly she unties the sash to her gray robe and lets it drop to the floor. She is naked underneath it, always. He hasn't supplied her with underwear for at least...two weeks? He had finally ripped apart the one pair she had, blood-stained and dingy as it had been. She had been sad to see it unceremoniously deposited into the trash.

Hinata steps forward, stoic and resolute, but stops when he begins to laugh. It's a metamorphosis on his face: His eyes briefly close as he snickers between clenched teeth, eyebrows knitted together in an effort to keep himself under control. He fails in this endeavor.

"I - haha - I only expected you - heh - to suck me off for whatever it was you wanted - "

The self-loathing Hinata feels for herself in that moment is like acid eating away at her heart. The goosebumps on her arms rise as cold dread flushes through her.

His giggling quickly dies down as he attempts to reclaim that air of self-confident detached flippancy that, to her dull surprise, conjures up a mental image of a young Sasuke Uchiha during one of his less dour moods.

Deidara waves offhandedly towards something invisible, a gesture of nonchalance as if this were a matter of planning what eatery to visit on a lazy Saturday. The lying, malicious man that he is...

Her ears suddenly tune back in as she catches the last bit of his next sentence: "But since you're so _willing_ to go the extra mile..."

He shifts in his spot, transfers his head to one fist while his other hand is outstretched to take hers, eyes narrowed and mouth twisted in such an infuriatingly smug expression.

" _Come here, yeah."_

It's a demand. She can't deny him now that he's made up his mind.

So she doesn't.

* * *

Hinata gives him what he wants, as much as he wants, however he wants, until she's drenched in sweat and openly sobbing.

To Deidara's credit, it feels good. Intermittently. She still hasn't quite figured out if it's a coincidence, a kink of his to make his captive reluctantly moan his name, or if he's delusional enough to think they're lovers. She thinks it's all three and none of the above at various times.

* * *

It is some day afterwards, or perhaps the same day, she can't tell anymore, that she feels his presence at _her...his?...their?...the_ bedside.

She reluctantly opens her eyes. He is looming over her, hair up and uniformed. The only light in the room is that which spills out from outside the open door, and that is dim and similarly ominous. All she can make out is a dark stone wall. 

The fact that he isn't setting up a temporary seal at this point to prevent her from escaping...it's something she doesn't want to consider after just waking up, his confidence in his ability to keep her tethered here in this bed from his presence alone. She hates how right he is.

The collar hides his mouth, though his face is so cast in shadow from the lack of natural light that she isn't capable of ascertaining his expression regardless of his attire. She can assume his eye is staring at her sharply like it usually is, though whether mirthful or not, cruel or not, she doesn't know.

Hinata is startled by the weight and sound of _something_ falling atop her stomach. Her hand immediately slips out from beneath the covers to grab ahold of it, and recognizes it as a package of some sort, covered in paper and secured with twine. Probably the size of...a small loaf of bread.

When she sits up to address him and his gift, her _nemaki_  slips down her shoulder. The air is room temperature but his presence seems to lower it by ten degrees. She can feel his gaze idly trace this vulnerability like cold metal. She shivers, he leans down and she catches sight of his grin.

He grabs her by the chin to kiss her full on the lips. She closes her eyes and silently prays that this will be all he requires of her for now.

He releases her after a few moments, and she immediately turns back to the package. It'll ground her, keep her safe, if she just focuses on it. "I'm a man of my word, hm."

She blinks. The gears in her head start and stop. "I-what?"

He makes a noise of impatience, staring hard at her profile. His ego is so fragile that he is under the false impression that she possesses the will and inclination to tease. Her, the meek little mouse that she is, the _little girl_ that would have been better off being born into a civilian household and not ever face the possibility of ending up _here_.

Hinata's half-closed eyes choose to follow the finger that has entered her line of sight. It taps the package.

_tap tap tap_

His breath is warm and fans her face. It smells like toothpaste and ramen. "You wanted something so I asked you to show me _how much_ you wanted it, yeah. You did as you were told - quite well, as always - "

_ta-ap_

" - so I fulfilled my end."

Hinata's mouth presses into a line of its own accord.

He straightens himself at the lack of her response to his clarification and actually _huffs_ as he crosses his arms, turns slightly. "Well, the least you could do is show some gratitude, yeah."

The borderline-sulky tone he takes at that point is almost laughable. She wants to tell him that no matter how many gifts that may be bestowed upon her, trinkets and sweets don't make up for the fact that she is a prisoner, that his random gestures of generosity do not distract her from the fantasy she has recently conjured up for herself. One that involves her own skin and the sharpest knives and gallons of bleach.

She remains silent, though, and instead scrutinizes the knot tying the whole thing together. Without something sharp it'll take a lot of work, and Deidara didn't seem in any hurry to offer her any help in that regard.

And just what exactly _is_ it _?_

Movement out of the corner of her eye alerts her that he's leaving now. She raises her head to watch him with incredulity.

Just like that, he's leaving?

Her dry mouth conjures up a question: "W-What.."

He stops, and for less than a fraction of a moment she worries that her decision to speak up is now too-little, too-late. The muscles in her neck pull taut when he looks over his shoulder to consider her. The light from the outside world casts dramatic shadows on his nose, his lips, his hair.

The package is like a rock in her lap. Why had she asked for something in the first place? "W-what is it?"

To her wary surprise, he grins mischievously and hums a single note in amusement. His mouth is something evil, cast in darkness as it stretches across his face. "Something to keep you entertained while I'm gone." Can I even get it open, though? "My dearest hope," he says with a disquieting measure of false wistfulness, "is that you'll think of me whenever you...well, I don't want to spoil the surprise, hmm." The last bit makes him chuckle.

She reluctantly lowers her eyes to the package, silently willing him to leave.

Her finger rubs against one of the thin cords holding it all together.

Before she can stop herself, she blurts out a " _thank you"_ that he takes with an invisible hand and pockets quietly as he makes his exit.

The light on the floor rapidly slices thinner as he closes the door. When the sound of the conventional lock _clicks_ and his customary shuffling of replacing the seals begin outside, Hinata lets out a breath and waits in what is essentially darkness.

Footsteps that echo and grow fainter and then...silence.

Hinata's hand floats in the air as she searches for the lamp she knows is to her left on the bedside table. When it is turned on it manages to only illuminate a small perimeter around her person. There are still dark corners of the room that remain unaffected by the weak lights. It makes navigation sometimes difficult if she stares at them for too long, and she worries that if she were ever to escape her Byakugan would be severely affected. She had never been deprived of natural light for this long, never had her chakra rendered inaccessible for a similarly lengthy amount of time, either.

Such thoughts had initially worried her, but over time they had been swallowed up by a growing apathy. No, resignation.

Shadows have never been a phobia of hers. Even if they were, she has studied this room's interior for so long in lieu of entertainment that its potential mysteries are non-existent.

She once again appraises the parcel in her possession, curious and wary.

_I hope it isn't a bomb._

_It wouldn't be,_ says the reasonable voice that echoes in her head. To lay such a trap for her...it's too convoluted as-is. The Akatsuki didn't seem like people who would take on members that would trade flair over efficiency.

_Then again..._

As to how she'll even open the thing, Hinata is still unsure.

She tries, though. At first she picks at the knot with nails that have been chewed to the quick during her time here.

_Pk, pk, pk-pk-pk. Pkpkpkpkpk._

It doesn't give. She attempts to pry the string apart with her bare hands, but she only succeeds in threatening to raise welts against her skin the harder she tugs. Something rattles within the package when she does so, and her curiosity grows along with her frustration.

Any minute amount of give that she may have established by working at the knot reversed itself when she made the mistake of using brute strength.

So she resorts to using her teeth, and she pushes the soft snippet of an idea out of her head, the one that says this is very undignified of her to do. 

Why was she so _weak?_ It's not a big deal, it's just -

She has been given a _gift_ , something that could potentially while away time and stave off boredom and _insanity_ and this string was the only thing standing in her way..!

It takes quite awhile, grinding her teeth like she is.

The taste of the twine, she identifies it as hemp, coats her tongue. Very quickly saliva drips down her chin because _she is_ _almost there_ and _it will give it_ will _it will_ -

Her hands threaten to crush the box with how hard she is gripping it to keep it in place, and for a split second she wonders what she will do - what will _he_ do - if she finally manages to open it only to find her _gift_  broken.

A piece of the twine snaps out from her mouth and it is then that she realizes (with something nearing pleasant surprise) that her stubbornness has borne fruit. 

With more enthusiasm she works on another thread and manages to gnaw that one apart, as well.

The paper comes off without much flourish and she is left with what honestly looks like a small shoe box, and she immediately begins to brainstorm as to what could be inside.

Her hands settle on either side of it.

Hinata closes her eyes, breathes in, opens them.

The box hovers in the air as she attempts to slide the cover off. When it plops back onto her lap, she removes it from her line of sight, and looks down.

Before she can even register what she is seeing, her face is flushing. Her head is blank as her chest tightens.

She realizes her mouth is open, but she cannot will it to close. She hears herself wheezing, unable to form a coherent audible thought.

It feels as if her throat has been swabbed with rubbing alcohol, cool and sharp and dry.

 _Th-This..this is_..

_H-He...He..He..ahh.._

"Aah...aah... _aah...aah..!_ "

Without a thought, the box goes flying into the darkness. She only registers that someone is wailing after she hears it crash against the wall, and then understands it is _her_ who is making these horrible noises after it then quickly lands on the floor.

The _thing_ is loosed from its container and rolls across the black floor. It is to her horror that her ears pick up on its activated state.

_Bzzzzzz bzzzzzz bzzzzzz_

Fingers claw at her face as the sound of the buzzing fills her ears. They drift up into her hair and pull hard, as hard as he does during sex. She immediately stops with panic pouring into her gut at the realization that he has tainted her; she can't punish herself without reminding herself of how he has done similarly when he violates her on this bed and against the wall and on the floor and -

_Bzzzzzz bzzzzz bzzzzz_

-wants to destroy it, but how. She doesn't want to touch the thing, doesn't want to go near it, doesn't want to acknowledge that it exists.

_Bzzzzzz bzzzzz bzzzzz_

The room is filled with her sobbing and the vulgar noises from his -

_The cruelty, the absolute cruelty._

She can't breathe she can't breathe -

_Bzzzzzz bzzzzz bzzzzz_

Her knees hit the floor as she struggles to disentangle herself from the sheets. Pathetically, yet familiarly, she crawls across the floor. Her hands are frantic in their sweeping along, almost blind in their searching. The thing is well beyond the perimeter of light afforded by the meager lamp, and its sound seems to permeate the air evenly. Where is it, where is it, where?

The box is found first, a useless clue. It could have been propelled anywhere with the force she had used to discard it.

_Bzzzzzz bzzzz bzzzzz_

Where where where where where.

Hinata spends the next ten minutes feeling all around for his cursed gift. Her initial lack of success serves as a refreshed source of her tears. Eventually it is out of physical pain from the sound of it burrowing through her skin and ears, stomach and tongue, heart and teeth.

_Bzzzzzz bzzzz bzzzz_

She lets out a cry of surprise when her hand finally brushes over it and draws back with her entire body. Near the _kotatsu_ is where it had ended up; luckily it hadn't ended up rolling underneath it...

Under "normal" circumstances she would have likely taken a moment to gather herself before attempting to touch it again, but the _sound_ it is making her jaw ache from how hard she is clenching it.

She grabs it and grimaces for only a second before reaching down and grabbing it.

It is in her hand for about three seconds and she lets go.

_Bzzzzz bzzzz bzzzzzzz_

To touch it on purpose, she does not want to. This disgusting, this vulgar, this abnormal _thing_ that he has-

She repeats the process twice more, failing, despair growing, but also hatred. Hatred for this thing, for him, for herself.

Taking a deep breath, she grabs it a final time and clenches her teeth as she forces herself to hold it firmly in her hand and to _not_ think about what she's holding, _not_ consider how it feels, _not_ reflect on its shape and its intended purpose -

_Bzz -_

She turns it off and then immediately lets it fall back to the floor where it clatters and settles, inert and silent.

Head pounding and jaw aching from the sudden release of tension, she crawls back to the bed.

For a minute or two she rests her head against the bedside to collect herself. Her _nemaki_  is beginning to stick to her skin from sweat that she has only now become aware of.

No other sound in the room other than her breathing can be heard. She doesn't know if that can be considered a comfort right now, but it has to be.

She'll find the courage to dispose of it after taking a short rest. As to how, she doesn't know.

_I don't want to touch it. I don't want to touch it. I don't want to touch it._

It is then that she hauls herself up with minimal effort and burrows underneath the covers. She curls up and hugs herself tightly.

Her last conscious moments are of her shivering.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry this turned out like ...well, just a repetitive narration. It was the last bit that I had trouble really hashing out, but I hope you understood what was happening. If you don't then that means *I* failed, not you LOL
> 
> Um..thoughts?
> 
> P.S. Oops. I am ashamed. I thought a *nemaki* was a *yukata* and so I used the latter instead of the former. I feel so embarrassed. Naturally, I changed *yukata* to *nemaki* in this chapter. (DIES)


	12. Soaked

It's time for a bath. The following unfolds per routine: 

He announces she reeks and needs to be washed. He pulls her into the bathroom after a beat of silence in which she does not deign to protest. 

The bathroom is neither personable nor cozy like the one she had back home. Instead of being furnished with wood, the floor and walls are cold stone. The spigot which fills the bucket with water is tinged green. There is only one stool and she can tell it's the most recent feature to this room given how it shows no significant signs of wear or mold.

There is no source of heating other than that supplied by the inevitably accumulated steam. Normally she could handle the humidity that occurs naturally in a bathroom - it is technically no different from an onsen - but with her habit of taking shallow breaths when anxious, and with him being the main cause of her anxiety, the burden for air is like that of two fists clenching around her lungs, threatening suffocation. He, on the other hand, does not betray any signs of major discomfort save for the inevitable sweat that accumulates on both of their brows.

He practically throws down her wrist and barks at her to undress. She does, and is given no privacy. Something that is mildly bemusing is how, after all this time, he still finds her body novel enough to leer at, which he does shamelessly as she undoes the tie to her yukata.

He has appraised her body from every imaginable angle, has painted nearly every inch of her skin with vile sweat, blood, and semen. 

But perhaps it is something to be thankful for, his enduring interest. If he were to get bored...what would happen to her then? 

Even though it is ever a possibility, she is still caught off-guard when he pushes her down to the floor. She lets out a cry for the pain that shoots into her hip which is then only marginally offset by the coolness of the tiles. He drops low and is upon her instantly. With a level of calm and practice that can only come from routine he wastes no time in loosening the tie to his own evening wear and settling between her legs. She can feel that hard part of him for one moment and the next it is pushing inside her and he is raping her on that tiled floor. 

It's always fast and painful. Blood usually flows from between her legs because after all this time he still doesn't care about her comfort for the most part. Her skin is chafed, scuffed, and rubbed raw as it is scraped against whichever grainy surface, horizontal or vertical, he has decided to use as a replacement for a table or mattress.

Bruises on bruises on welts on welts on cuts on cuts.

When he finishes it is with that characteristic shudder and a murmur of praise as to how good she feels around his cock. Her eyes are tear-filled from the pain, nothing more (or so she tells herself), and it is through that swimming blurriness that she can see the face staring down at her is not really seeing her in turn. She is not her. 

When he gets to his feet, Hinata is afforded a peculiar angle as she watches him crack his neck and look around for the supplies he will need for bathing the two of them. It is what he had originally intended for them to do, after all, wasn't it?

Somehow she manages to roll onto her side. She needs to be ready before he sets everything up. He likes her to be on top of things and doesn't consider that what he does to her greatly inhibits her ability to do just that. Hinata dimly marvels at how cold the stone is and how much it all hurts. She tries not to dwell on that too much, though, or the fact that she can feel his essence leaking out of her in the most vulgar and disgusting way. 

Her eyes idly watch his bare feet make their way over the same floor that is pressed against her cheek.

The cruel man would then metaphorically pounce on her again after a short time. His incessant nature is so much more exasperating because he refuses to allow her to curl up on herself and shut him out. He has needs, after all. She is there for his entertainment.

In this version of events, he kicks at her knees and tells her to get up. It's time for her to make herself useful and wash him.

It takes a minute for Hinata to gather enough resolve before sitting herself up. He is already shedding himself of his yukata and letting it drop to the floor. He will want her to do the same.

That jarring purr of wood against tile as he toes a stool out from against the wall before plonking himself down onto it. He casually reaches up and Hinata, now propped on her elbows, finds his strong back obscured by a long wave of hair that falls from its tie. After ensuring that she is making a concerted effort to hurry along, he turns away and sits himself on his stool, elbows perched on his knees, finger tips together in such a deceptively patient way.

It takes her a few minutes more to gather enough energy and composure to crawl obediently behind him. Her hair similarly flows over her back, but down her shoulders as well. The tresses have gotten so long they now only just brush against the floor. 

But he can’t help himself. He turns his head again. She can feel his eyes linger on her as she makes her way to her designated place, consider the newly-made bruises, her exorbitantly lengthy hair, her trembling lower lip, and the way her ribs have begun to press gently against her flesh in recent times. Thankfully he doesn't slap her like one would to a beast of burden to hurry them along. 

And so much like a handmaiden in service to a haughty prince, she kneels and sets to complete her task.

Hinata's hands work diligently but at a reasonable pace. She has come to learn that going too slowly makes him impatient, or else it is construed as sensual, gives him the mistaken impression that she wants him to fuck her again. 

'Recovered so quickly, have you? I’m up for more. If you stop crying I promise I'll make you come this time, hmm.'

If she works too quickly, however, she is assaulted all the same with just as much violence. Instead of lust it is in defense of his eggshell-thin ego that she seems to pierce so easily. Find him repulsive, would she? Little bitch.

And yet he still is wont to behave petulantly when he is reminded of the fact that she does not touch him for her own personal fulfillment or because she genuinely considers him to be a nice, handsome man, or that he's managed to break her into wholeheartedly accepting him as her god and demon.

It frustrates him -

\- because she does hate him, so very much - 

\- and that unspoken reality incites his ire, as well.

Of course her first time in these facilities were filled with pain. She had made a mistake in acting indecisive and timid when prompted to bathe him. Now whenever she looks at a bar of soap her jaw twinges for a moment in memory of the punishment she had undergone for her transgression.

For now, though, she simply washes. Silently, obediently.

His shoulder blades are defined and sharp, a pale scar here and there highlighted against his tanned skin. Dirt and whatever white dusty substance that seems to always cling to him is scrubbed away in silence.

If there is one thing—absolutely one thing—that she can silently hold as a positive quality about him, it's his hair. Lush and thick and very healthy.. Hinata doesn't know if its length is simply another manifestation of his rebellious, high-spirited nature or if it's perhaps a matter of culture, a remnant from his life as a shinobi of the Village Hidden in the Rock.

She doesn't feel "close" enough to him to ask, of course. Oh no, they did not currently possess that sort of relationship where it would be permissible to interview him. 

Oddly enough, he does not ask much about her past, either. Perhaps he already knows all he wants to know. Perhaps he doesn't care. That is one less thing to worry about, the possibility of being tortured for secrets. Or maybe that's still a possibility in the near-future. 

She continues washing, letting that thought fade as quickly as it had come.

Hair that turns dark gold when wet. Much more vibrant than...Ino's..hair was...is..

Stop it.

In fact, its color reminds her of how striking Naru--

Don't. Don't finish that thought. Don't.

Hinata is almost done, tears silently slipping down her cheeks. Only three tears, though. She feels them, counts them over and over, as she raises the tub of water to rinse the suds out of his hair. One two three. One two three. One one one two three three.

It is then that he waves her hand away and reaches behind him to grab the drenched mop of locks now hanging down his back. He stands, turns to look down at her, and orders her to refill the bucket because it's her turn now.

She keeps her eyes downcast as she murmurs an affirmative and does as she's told. He didn't comment on her tears. Either he didn't see them or he wasn't in the mood to address how pathetic she was being. Small mercies.

Hinata soon finds herself sitting with her knees together on that little stool, offhandedly aware that the cold floor has rendered her toes numb. She doesn't move to squeeze warmth into them. She doesn't want to set him off by moving unnecessarily.

He washes her hair gently, hums to himself as he does so. It bounces off the walls and into her ears a thousand times over. His lips find her soaped shoulders and he places kiss after kiss on them after wiping away old sweat.

Hands then snake out from behind to grope at her chest. His tongue presses flat against her throat. As is often the case, any attempts made by him to play the sensual lover fall dreadfully short: Uninspired and inappropriate.

But when he strokes her nipples, they stiffen. When the soapy washcloth slides between her parted legs and begins to lather, the bubblish sensation is somewhat pleasurable. Somewhat.

"Just helpin' you get this all nice and clean, hmm.." she hears him say softly against her ear.

Of course he is. Of course he is.

In the back of her head, Hinata is somewhat..relieved, grateful that her body only responds to him through manipulation. She must be driven to arousal: It does not occur of its own volition but by force.

Another thought, one that is inky black and murky, wonders if, regardless, he is conditioning her body to only respond to ill treatment, if he is purposely spoiling her so as to render her ill-suited to anything or anyone but his choleric personality.

She dismisses it, because dwelling on such a possibility would only lead to another level of despair of which she is not prepared to descend into.

Not yet.

A body apathetic towards her heart and instead mechanically responding to that which it was naturally programmed to do. She knows above all else that this isn't her enjoying this. It was her body. While no less shameful at times, she retains some resolve that the person she is, was not this.

No matter how much he continues to murmur the contrary into her sudsy hair.

"Have I told you how soft your skin is—" Hinata's brain prickles at his words drifting to nestle around her eardrums " —especially here." He works briefly yet firmly at her clitoris to emphasize his point.

He is arousing her. Not arousing her but arousing her. She can picture it as it happens, the swelling, how blood is pooling to engorge her flesh to look like fruit ready to be eaten. He's made such a comparison several times before. Hopefully he doesn't repeat himself with that line once again.

Coming from his mouth, such flattery, if it can be even called that, is obscene, the height of vulgarity.

Deidara continues prodding and rubbing that part of her that should be left well enough alone while he lathers soap across her stomach with a sponge.

Amidst all this, he is still humming. Not a song but drawn-out notes at various pitches. They're not unpleasant to her ears aesthetically but somehow a sense of claustrophobia begins to creep up from within her own head.

And then he stops. Stops rubbing, stops humming. Retreats his mouth from her neck and his hands from between her thighs.

Her hands, gripping the small lips on either side of the small stool, tighten in anticipation. Because something will happen. Something will — 

Without warning a bucket of water is dumped over her head. She starts at the assault and lets out a cry of surprise. He dismisses her momentary distress with a quickly lobbed "shut up".

The pebble of abuse that had been flicked at her is accepted with silence as she obeys. She chooses to focus on the cracked tiles of the floor, idly raises her hand to wipe at the droplets clinging to her lashes. It is futile, but she doesn't let up until he admonishes her to stop moving.

The gel shampoo is squirted over the top of her head. Immediately she can feel gravity's pull compel it to slide slowly down and sink through the top layer of her hair. He always uses too much.

His hands set to work it into her scalp. Foam quickly accumulates and the minuscule bubbles begin fizzing incessantly in her ears. Some of the foam plops onto her shoulder and slides down her arm. More down her back and neck. He's always messy.

He's just as thorough with her as she is with him. She has to give him that bit of credit, too. When he wants her clean, he doesn't do a poor job of it. Though, he's not nearly as gentle with her as when...Hanabi...and her..washed each other's hair when they were younger.

Some foam flies past her and plops at her feet. Her head is being wrenched around as he tries to, she doesn't know, scrub down every hair follicle she possessed. He's being very enthusiastic about it, much more so than she believes is necessary. Thankfully, he is silent for now. 

Just as she begins to suspect that his intention truly is to render her bald, he extricates his fingers from her hair. "Wait here, hmm.." 

He leaves her to refill the bucket. Hopefully he won't spring it on her without warning like the first time.

Hinata's mind is empty. She tasks herself with completing a small mental exercise by tracing the whiteish grout that outlines the tiled floor. All the gray or otherwise discolored "routes" are off-limits. There are many paths her eyes can take to transport her from her feet to the wall. After a few rounds she turns her head to expand her game further across the floor. So many more avenues are opened just with a slight craning of her neck. 

And all she can hear are the bubbles. Fizzing, fizzing, constantly fizzing. The tap being turned on with a harsh squeak and water flowing into an empty container.

A modest thrill settles within her because her gaze fills with a fresh new maze of gray and white grout to navigate, to explore. 

Unconsciously she reaches up to tuck back hair behind her ear and then remembers it's soaking wet and plastered to her face. Of course. She had forgotten. It's fine, though. She finds a new route to explore and it's diverged into three possible paths. Which one should she choose? She took the right one last time -- 

"What are you looking at?"

Hinata starts. When she turns in her spot to look back at him, guilt floods her.

She has done nothing wrong, though.

And yet. And yet. 

He is standing there under the dim light, bucket in hand. Her eyes dance over his genitals and land on his chest because she does not want to give him any ideas. 

They land on that...tattoo of his, if it even is one, standing proudly in black against tanned skin. A peculiar design she had not come across until she met him. What remains an even greater mystery are the threads laced into his very skin. It reminds her of another mouth. 

His body is well-defined and athletic despite his skills lying in long-range combat, but she supposes that her body, too, leads one to misconstrue her abilities. Despite the finesse and power that the nature of her clan's Gentle Fist affords, she still carries weight in her thighs and hips. Her arms have not formed muscle like Sakura or Ino even though medical ninjutsu required similar discipline in controlling both movement and chakra. 

Her stomach has remained soft yet fairly flat. Her toes are no more disfigured than any other shinobi whose feet have met the ground in quick succession during numerous missions. As for scars, she possesses the remnant of an incision situated through the valley of her breasts, acquired under circumstances that to this day she remains unaware of. Though childhood memories seem to blur nowadays, she knows that she did not have it before her first attempt at the Chunin Exams. She remembers her cousin Neji attempting to shatter her chakra network when they faced off in the Preliminaries. She was removed and hospitalized and then...she got worse at some point, and then magically better. 

Deidara hadn't taken notice of it yet. She honestly doesn't know what smart quip he would or could make about it even if he were to.

With a dry tongue she murmurs "nothing" and turns her back to him, straightens herself with her hands in her lap. Obediently waiting for him to proceed.

His footsteps slap wetly against the floor until they come to a stop behind her. For a moment she's afraid he will hit her. Why? No reason. There is almost never a clearly-defined reason for anything he does other than ‘I want to’. 

"Last time." he says. Hinata holds her breath and a split second later she is subjected to being doused with what feels like the force of a waterfall. Her neck only bows slightly at the extremely short-lived vortex of pressure. She opens her eyes and spits the water away as it drizzles off the tip of her nose and against her lips.

She knows she is done. He has all but said so. But she remains sitting there, dripping, wet skin turning clammy and chill despite the unbearable amount of steam and humidity.

A towel is thrown at her back. It is wadded up into a ball and bounces rudely off her before falling in a heap onto the wet tiles. As she twists in her place to retrieve it, she internally laments that its intended purpose has now been rendered obsolete. Indeed, a good portion of it is already damp to her fingers from soaking up the water on the floor.

It is all she is given. She doesn't dare to glance up at him to find where he is. She's afraid it will be misconstrued as ungrateful or..something that would not turn out in her favor. Like a shawl she drapes it over her shoulders, taking a moment to meditate briefly on that stool that she finds herself hunched atop like a freezing refugee.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Been sitting on this one for who knows how long. Been reading some really good psychological mindfuck stories lately and decided to continue this one since there are still a few ideas left. Not sure if I'll give this a proper end other than "I have no more ideas, so I'm done updating". Not sure when that will be. Maybe a chapter from now, maybe three, maybe this one already. Who kno0o0o0ws ~(._.)~
> 
> Tell me what you think. When you have several ideas like I did for this story, you end up with uneven development, yet it's a story that doesn't have a particular narrative at all, but if I were to backtrack, it wouldn't make much sense. Boo.
> 
> I didn't know how to end this particular chapter, so I decided to stop in the middle of a scene. Also boo.


End file.
